Reviews & Ratings for
Journey 2: The Mysterious Island More at IMDbPro »

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67 out of 89 people found the following review useful:
Entertaining film for the family – and nothing more, 8 February 2012

Author: Victor Yamaguchi from Brazil

Journey 2: The Mysterious Island is the 'sequel' of Journey to the Centre of Earth (starring Brendan Fraser). Actually, I really don't know why they consider it a sequel because the story is completely different – the only similarities are the author of the books in which the films were based on (Jules Verne) and the character of Sean Anderson that appears in both movies. I also found interesting that many people didn't know it was related to the other movie.

What we have here is a film that follows the same scheme of its predecessor – a lot of CGI and 3D effects, amazing and colorful scenarios, silly humor and nothing more. Journey 2 is a movie for all ages - specially the kids - so don't expect violent sequences or sex scenes with your favorite stars.

The plot is traditional and there is obviously those parallel stories - like the boy Sean(Josh Hutcherson) who falls in love with the charming Khailani (Vanessa Hudgens) and his relationship with his mother's boyfriend, Hank – played by Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson who shows us that the 'tough guys' can also be funny, charismatic and do movies that they don't have to kill a hundred people.

So, are you thinking about taking your kids to the movies? Well, take them to watch Journey 2: The Mysterious Island - they will be thrilled by it.

But, even if you don't have any kids, watch it. Who said that adults have only to watch serious and artistic movies? Sometimes a little bit of unpretentious fun is necessary in life - and this movie provides it (at least for me it did).

73 out of 108 people found the following review useful:
Great movie, forgot the trollers here., 20 February 2012

Author: torchos from Toronto, Canada

This movie lacks what it takes to take an Oscar Award, lacks the sensitivity and depth....blah blah blah, forget all that noise...go see the movie with your kids they would love it.

This movie is for Kids, and parents who have kids. I took my daughter to see it today in 3D. Excellent visual effects, entire movie had effects, you did not take your glasses off at all or you'd miss the next 3d effect that is right around the corner. The cast was good, The Rock was great and jokes were funny, this movie was child safe and had everything that your young one would want, lots of effects, action, above and underwater. I would definitely recommend it in 3D. The pace of movie is fast and if you have kids ....you can appreciate this.

I rated this movie for what it is...a kids movie. Are you going to leave the theater discussing the virtues of Plato? NO! but your kids will be going on about this and that in the movie. Worth Admission? Absolutely. Asked my daughter what she rated it....9.5 she said. Was it worth it? When your child says 9.5 what the heck else matters?????

45 out of 66 people found the following review useful:
silly unbelievability, 5 March 2012

Author: jlj9675-1 from United States

After seeing the trailers, I looked forward to this movie. But although I am a fan of Dwayne Johnson, I cannot recommend this movie to much of anyone. It moves too quickly at the beginning. The premise is interesting but completely implausible, especially the time frame. Some of the scenery is enjoyable but fleeting. Michael Caine's character is entirely too negative. The special effects were not very realistic either. The plot was designed to be a dramatic thriller but it was so pat it was boring. I almost left before the ending as there was no mystery left shortly into the film. Also, the two young people were rather lackluster and the pilot was annoying. For something that held so much promise of a lovely adventure, it was a big disappointment.

43 out of 64 people found the following review useful:
Nice 3D and CGI. Awful characters to take a Journey with., 4 February 2012

Author: MosHr from United States

"Journey 2: The Mysterious Island" is a blue-screen CGI extravaganza that is mixed in with the picturesque Hawaii locations, but containing a plot that is essentially all told in the trailer and presented with the dynamics of an amusement park tour. The "2" in "Journey 2" is because it is the sequel to the 2008 movie "Journey to the Center of the Earth"; the "The Mysterious Island" in the title because both movies are both derived from books by Jules Verne.

Watching "Journey 2" is like being stuck in a vacation with five slightly unpleasant people with slightly uncomfortable dynamics between. Sean (Hutcherson) is bratty and overly entitled, Hank (Johnson) his stepfather and Alexander (Caine) his grandfather are constantly bickering, the tour guide Gabato (Guzman) is overly emasculated and his daughter Kailani (Hudgens) surly.

The 3D, the CGI of the island and the sets are perhaps main draw of the movie. We see elephants as big as cats and bees as big as cars. The effects are mostly impressive all around but it never manages to find the right pace or impact because it just comes in one after another without the dramatic tension. It's hard to care about the perils or be in awe at what's shown when the characters are so thin.

After watching the movie, I get this feeling that the Rock had way too much creative input in the movie. His absurd peck joke from the trailer aside, his character is a prize-winning Navy cryptographer who also knows structural engineering and who can also play a mean ukulele and really hold down a tune (although awful singing truth be told); This all hints at the big guy pretending to be smart and sensitive. Combine this with the almost palpable resentment between him and Caine and the sickening obsequiousness of Guzman towards him, it just feels uncomfortable.

While the movie is impressive as a 3D CGI set piece, it is severely let down by the characters. A lot of kids/family movies lately have this undertone of spoiled rich American kid gets everything he wants but this movie does this in a very ugly way. Kids will overlook all these flaws in the movie and be mesmerized by the 3D and special effects but I think adults would find it a bit pointless and uncomfortable. Empty entertainment for kids is my view of this movie.

33 out of 47 people found the following review useful:
Awful... for kids, but awful, 3 March 2012

Author: George Dragomir from Romania

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I cannot begin to describe the levels of wrong and awfulness for this movie. I'll just bring it down to this:

I don't know what was worse. The story, the acting, or The Rock playing the ukulele.

The lines, the mimics, the situations, even the humor (which was supposed to be funny... don't know how yet.. ) looked, sounded and felt like plastic bags. They all felt so unnatural, and out of character. I can't yell at mister Wrestler.. he did his best for what he can do. But Vanessa, honey, you have a Disney background, you should be good at this stuff... it's a kids movie.. good acting = good movie. Having a red wet shirt on you throughout the scenes, that's not really appropriate.

The story is... well there isn't much of a story... only that 3 different people, wrote about the same island, and encrypted its map and location in their books. The island (Atlantis) runs by a 'tectonic plate clock cycle', diving in the ocean and resurfacing every X amount of years. However, if the island was destroyed each time it went under the ocean, how did it rebuild itself? Answer : A wizard did it...

I wonder how they didn't get sued for using 'Yoda' which is a LucasArts trademark. I also wonder why did they try to build The Rock's character into a muscled 'MacGuyver' and a Wizard, and a Scientist, and an ex Navy Seal, and a Wise Man ... and .. must I go on?

Also, the kid, is so dumb... that a chick has to drop the curtain and tell him : "Oh gee.. stop whining like an 8 year old.. for having a step dad who cares about you.. wouldn't it be worse if you didn't had him at all???". For being that stupid, you deserve to sink and die with the damn island, and maybe you'd get reconstructed each 140 years like the island does.. Yes sir..

The only good thing about this movie, is the CGI, which was well done, no argument there.

And one more thing. I laughed so hard at this. I imagined there would be something like this in the movie (adding up to Vanessa's red wet shirt). A kids movie = parents are there too. So how to keep them awake or not drunk in the theater (also entertained would be a much suitable word)? Yes, you got that right.. Vanessa's buttocks: Central Framed, HD, 3D go watch it now (during the escape from Nemo's burial room).

Overall: probably good for kids, probably good for drunk adults, most likely awful to everyone that noticed how the movie industry is on a downfall, and how each year it gets worse.

23 out of 34 people found the following review useful:
An actual viewer opinion - Not even kids worthy., 23 May 2012

Author: sk_razor from Bulgaria

I cant spoil the story as there is barely any to find.

The only one/s who truly earned any coin in this movie are the people who did the trailer, because they managed to put together a clip from the none existent content of the film.

Suffice to say, I can bet you the 80 million dollars to that took to make this film that first graders and/or some random drunken people in a bar can come with a better screen play.

Its so bad that you can see everyone of the actors in the film can not believe they are actually going through with this scene after scene.

Its so excessively dull that I wouldn't even want my children to see it.

The ONLY thing you can do to make this film bare-able is to turn of the audio and watch it as a mute film. Anything you could imagine about the dialog would be better.

Its so bad that if you cut out all the sex and remotely sexual scenes of 100 pornographic films and stitch together the rest in a tape - it would be better than this so called film.

I'm only giving it a 3 because believe it or not I've seen worse ( : And CGI? Maybe we could have enjoyed the CGI if it wasn't crushingly burdened with carrying the dumbest dialog I've seen in years.

I'm only wasting my key taps on this "film" on the off chance that this will save someone the waste of time.

29 out of 46 people found the following review useful:
Mediocre in every sense of the word., 14 February 2012

Author: Jess Fuoco from United Kingdom

I was already less than impressed by the trailer, and when I saw the film my suspicions about the stale plot and characters where confirmed in full.

We begin with the routinely angsty teenage boy with the novel hobby, his conventionally careworn mother and his try-hard stepfather who "Just wants to be friends." Along the way we encounter many overused plot points, gags and characters.

There's the eccentric old man with a taste for cheesy catchphrases, the chubby simpleton who's only role is to inject some half rate comedy, the "breathtaking" jungle island full of dangerous beasts and beautiful creatures, and the pretty girl with the very low cut tank top who will at some point be put in mortal peril in order for the afore mentioned angsty teenage boy to prove himself worthy in the art of rescuing the damsel.

The plot was recycled, the acting was OK at best, and the dialogue had me rolling my eyes and sighing several times. The only redeeming factor was the special effects, and even then they were nothing I hadn't seen before.

Quite frankly, The film is, in my opinion, a film for children who don't pay mind to anything but the pretty colours and cool stunts. Nothing more.

12 out of 15 people found the following review useful:
When the Trailer Is Better than the Film, 1 July 2012

Author: Claudio Carvalho from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

The 17-year-old Sean Anderson (Josh Hutcherson) receives a coded signal and his stepfather Hank (Dwayne Johnson) helps him to decipher the message. They find that Sean's grandfather Alexander Anderson (Michael Caine) has found the mysterious island in the Pacific described by Julio Verne and two other writers in their novels.

The stubborn Sean wants to travel to the coordinates and Hank decides to buy the tickets and travel with the teenager to a small island nearby the location. They rent an old helicopter owned by the locals Gabato (Luis Guzmán) and his teenage daughter Kailani (Vanessa Hudgens) and the group heads to the unknown spot. Along their journey, they cross a hurricane and crash in the island. They find a beautiful and dangerous place, surrounded by forests, volcanoes with lava of gold and menacing life forms. The meet also the old Alexander and Hank discovers that the island is sinking. Now their only chance to survive is to find the legendary Nautilus.

"Journey 2: The Mysterious Island" is a movie with a trailer that is better than the film itself. The lame screenplay begins in a fast pace, with Hank and Sean guessing to quickly the message. The story is very weak and the film is supported by the special effects only. The spoiled Sean and the rude Alexander are detestable characters and Gabato is stupid and annoying and never funny as supposed to be. Hank is multi- skilled in codes, hydraulic and electric engineering, medicine, and music and diving. In the end, "Journey 2: The Mysterious Island" is a very disappointing adventure. My vote is four.

Title (Brazil): "Viagem 2: A Ilha Misteriosa" ("Journey 2: The Mysterious Island")

9 out of 11 people found the following review useful:
The Rock pulls hordes of random knowledge and skills out of his butt, 29 June 2012

Author: J Stone from United States

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

This movie is the kind of material prisoners at Guantanamo Bay are forced to watch during interrogations.

The Rock has to be the phoniest character out of this circus. In the movie he plays a character who is nothing short of a genius with an IQ comparable to that of the gods. Here is a list of all the BS The Rock pulls off throughout the movie:

-In the first 5 minutes of the movie, The Rock decodes a letter by converting the words in it into Morse code, then goes up with his stepson into the attic, pulls out 3 fantasy books about islands, rips out a page from each and pieces them together to form a f**king map and then decides to travel to this made-up location.

-Immediately after Michael Caine says, "I've spent 30 years researching about this island, and by my calculations it will not sink for another four years", The Rock, in all his glory, gets on all fours and drinks from a puddle of who knows what and then basically says, "I just drank out of this puddle, the island will sink in three days". How the f*** does The Rock know this?

-Shortly after Prophet Rock warns of an island apocalypse occurring in 3 days, everyone trips on acid and ride on bumblebees. Don't even ask how they know how to ride on giant bumblebees. It's all fun and games until The Rock's stepson dislocates his leg and another character gets defecated on.

-Pretty much the entire movie these fools have been searching for the edge of the island where the ocean is and upon seeing the ocean the All- Knowing Rock looks to his stepson and says, "The ocean level has risen 100 feet in the past 24 hours". Thanks for the memo, Mr. Autistic.

-The clowns need to find Captain Nemo's ship, which is a submarine and so is underwater somewhere on the outskirts of the island. If The Rock hadn't been a trained submarine-sniffing dolphin during the Cold War I do not think this band of devolved humans would make it back home. Upon reaching a cliff overlooking the ocean he miraculously spots Captain Nemo's submarine despite the fact that it is submerged under the crashing waves and nobody but the f**king director would know where it is located. The Rock then says to his stepson, "We need oxygen tanks". He then pulls out two Ziploc plastic bags and uses his hourly dose of bulls**t to create makeshift oxygen tanks that would work in any Winnie The Pooh story.

-Upon getting inside the submarine with his stepson, The Rock realizes that the engine of the submarine is dead. Then, through nothing short of divine intervention, The Rock gets the idea to use the local prehistoric electric eel to jump-start the engine and manages to do so using a harpoon and a fishbowl for a helmet.

11 out of 17 people found the following review useful:
What in the Hades was THAT, 20 May 2012

Author: David Werwolf (Primus_Gladius) from Slovenia

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I can not believe, how bad this movie was - - - Script was boring, clichéd, and utterly lazy.

Character development - - - - there was none

Directing - - - the director knows crap about his job

The plot was absolutely predictable, and boring

Acting - - - - The actors are good, but what they had to work with, was utter tripe. Michael Caine - - - one of the best actors in my book - - - Even he was struggling with this movie . . . I guess, even these actors have bills to pay I can't imagine why in the world he decided to do this movie - - - maybe he thought it will be fun.

"Chemistry" between the characters is forced, non existent. There was absolutely no charm in any of them . . .

CGI - - - it is not done properly, the scene at the beginning of the movie, you can see, that it was made with a model of a B206 helicopter, and the angle of a camera, to make it appear as it was real . . . . Today if you can figure out this kind of tricks in the movie, the alarm bells start ringing - - -

I am actually watching the movie now, just after riding the giant bees - - -

The logic behind the island, and it's evolution It is the same as the "holy bible" has - - - - Non existent, explanations are just thrown there, for the sake of it. But come on, they could have thought better logic behind the "science" of the island and evolution.

I understand that in fantasy movies there is no great room for logic, or explanation of certain things, but come on - - - - enough is enough - - - -

All in all - - - avoid this movie - - - I will stop watching it now, cos I can't stand it anymore - - - - it is an utter Tripe - - - - This kind of movies, are the reason I don't pay to see them in the cinema anymore . . . .

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